A new feature in Excel 2013, and one that is of great value if you're relatively new…with charting is the command, Recommended Charts.…You'll see it on the Insert tab in the ribbon.…Look at the popup, want us to recommend a good chart to showcase your data.…Well, let's highlight the data first that we're interested in.…Right here. Click Recommended Charts, and we see some…choices here, Column chart, Line chart, Stacked Column chart.…Notice as I click on these two, you see the name displayed to the right, that…helps us absorb some of the terminology here.…

Down here, a 100% stacked column. Now, this is not a collection here of all…possible choices. It's just a list of some possibilities…here that might work with this data. Now, who knows how, in the background, how…this is being decided, but it's up to you to make the decision as to which one you want.…Maybe it's this one. If you somehow say, I don't like any of…these, you can go to All Charts, perhaps you'll pick a different type maybe you'll…pick R. And then, the six variations on bar as you…

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Released

8/6/2013

Charts allow you to communicate information visually, in a way that's more impactful than raw data, and they happen to be one of the most powerful and easy-to-use features in Microsoft Excel. Let Dennis Taylor show you how to create different kinds of Excel charts, from column, bar, and line charts to exploded pies, and decide which type works best for your data. Plus, learn how to fine-tune your chart's color and style; add titles, labels, and legends; insert shapes, pictures, and text boxes; and pull data from multiple sources.

Topics include:

Selecting the right chart type

Choosing data to display as a chart

Creating charts fast with the Quick Analysis tool

Choosing a chart layout

Changing the location of the source data

Dealing with empty and hidden cells

Moving and resizing charts

Adding data labels

Analyzing existing and future data with trendlines

Adding shapes and arrows

Working with column, bar, line, pie, and area charts

Working with specialized chart types: Gantt, Pareto, and Frequency charts